Religion as the ground for growing the individual

Some background first ... I attend the West Village Salon Conversation Group. Last Tuesday — the discussion was about the selfishness of being unselfish — to paraphrase from my point of view.

During the discussion two of the members brought up two examples of how small individual contributions to the collective good can keep a "community" functioning for the benefit of the individual. One example was theoretical. The other was a concrete example. Though the concrete example came second in the discussion, I will start with it first.

The coffee serving area at the woman's office was in constant disarray until she set up the "rule" that each person do at least one housekeeping chore whenever they entered the coffee serving area: clean the coffeemaker, make coffee, put any trash in the wastebasket, empty the wastebasket, wipe down the serving area, etc.

They haven't had a problem since.

In the second example, the salon member told how a friend of his — a graduate student in complex systems at a West Coast university — had built a model relating to the mess of dirty dishes that accumulated in the kitchen sink in the students' living area.

In his model he worked out how often each person would have to clean up a given number of extra dishes than their own, to keep the area clean.

As these examples were laid out, I had an epiphany. This was the core value of religion: giving us the rules to keep a community not only from descending into chaos, but establishing the "ground" out of which the individual grows a productive life.

Even as we get our sustenance from our community — the ground of our existence — we have to fertilize/nurture — give back to — the ground. Our basic set of rules not for only giving back but for our expectations of receiving is our religion.

Is a basic rule of the Christian to give without consideration of receiving something in return directly in the reciprocity of the transaction? That I should not give to the powerful and wealthy, expecting favor, but give to "the least of these", as in "Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done [it] unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done [it] unto me." -Matthew 25:45 KJV

I think it a basic rule. It is why I call myself a Christian existentialist.

I believe life itself has established an order in the cosmos that dictates that nurturing the ground out of which I grow benefits me in ways that are not — necessarily — directly related to my immediate act. Is this not also the concept of karma?

This concept completes the mind wrap that we expect the reward from our "God", so it is a selfish act.

In this we define ourselves by whom or what we believe to be our "God".

After thought: Those who believe the sole pursuit of self-interest brings the greatest collective good have chosen greed as their "God". Existence repeatedly proves them wrong. It is a short-term illusion.